Amy Cherrix - Eye of the Storm: NASA, Drones, and the Race to Crack the Hurricane Code

Angela takes a photo of herself the day Hurricane Sandy made landfall in Staten Island, New York.

By 6:28 p.m., the situation on Staten Island had deteriorated. Inside the Dresch home Angela sent a frantic text message to her friend Jenna Kelly.

JENNA MY DINING ROOM IS FLOATING.

But Jenna couldnt possibly comprehend what was happening to Angelas house. In what looked like a scene from a disaster movie, a fourteen-foot ocean swell rolled into their neighborhood like a tidal wave. It was much worse than floating furniture. The whole dining room was being lifted from its foundation by rising water.

George, get back! Patricia shouted to her husband. In the time it took Angelas father to close the French doors behind him, the whole dining room was ripped off the house.

Hurricane Sandy had arrived.

Only a few minutes after Angela clicked Send on her text message to Jenna, the entire first floor was unsafe. The water was rising fast. The family knew they needed help. Patricia grabbed her cell phone and quickly dialed her brothers number. Gerard Spero answered and tried to reassure his sister. Im calling 911! he said. Patricia hung up and prayed her brother would be able to send the police. But the lines were clogged with hundreds of incoming emergency calls. Gerard was placed on hold... for forty-five minutes.

Too late, the Dresches realized they should have evacuated when they had the chance. They were trapped. The only option was to move to the second floor. Photos and heirlooms tempted the family as they climbed the stairs, but there wasnt time to collect keepsakes.

George led his wife and daughter into the bedroom closet. They hoped they would be safe there, among the neat rows of clothes hanging around them. The floors groaned against the weight of water. The wind sounded like it could tear the house apart. Patricia touched the wall. Her hand came away wet and the plaster bubbled beneath her fingers. Water seeped in all around them. They needed to move again.

Angela followed Patricia and George as they raced into the bathroom. Maybe they could wait it out, holding on to the sturdy sink and solid bathtub. George and Patricia sandwiched their youngest daughter between them while the water continued to rise.

Before long, the bathroom was completely flooded. The Dresches were up to their necks in frigid seawater. It was getting harder to hold on to the slippery sink with cold fingers. Patricia gripped it with one hand and clung to Angela with the other. The water began to crest over their heads. They each took a big breath of air before they went under.

Thats when the bathroom walls exploded.

The force of the collapse shoved the family out into what used to be their front yard. Now it was the ocean. One by one the family broke the waters surface, Patricia and Angela still holding hands. But something fell hard on their heads.

The roof.

They went under again. Beneath the black water, Patricia fought her way up, but something blocked her way to the surface. She reached out to push it away. Mother and daughter were wrenched apart.

Patricia resurfaced, gasping against the icy waves. She cast about desperately, looking for Angela, but saw only Georges head above water. Where was their daughter? Both parents searched the punishing current for anything to hold on to. Patricia looked up and spotted a thick wire just overhead. She lunged and managed to grab hold, barely registering that her lifeline was a telephone cable, an estimated sixty feet (18 m) above the ground.

Hold on! George screamed as another wave overtook them. He disappeared, too. Patricia was alone and could barely keep hold of the cable. But she couldnt help her family if she went under. Looking around, she saw something familiar in the swirling waterher soap dish. It was still connected to the bathroom wall, which was floating next to her. Patricia released the cable and grasped the wall. She floated down the block alone on her makeshift raft and eventually made her way to shallow water. She dragged herself onto a neighboring back porch. Patricia had no idea what had happened to her husband or daughter. Battered, bleeding, and freezing, she drifted in and out of consciousness, praying Angela and George somehow survived and that her family could be reunited.